Five
Sometimes a girl just needs to be one with her horse.
I ran a brush along Dream’s side as he munched on his lunch in his stall at my farm. I couldn’t believe how well he’d done at the Battaglia Stakes last week. I’d been praising the Lord ever since they announced Dream the winner. Though I knew he couldn’t possibly win all his future races, my hopes were high and my mind was firmly on cloud nine.
“Tuck’s done great things with you, hasn’t he, boy?”
Dream’s ears flickered, but his muzzle never lifted from the feed. I smiled, continuing to let muscle memory glide the brush over his soft hair.
“I don’t know what my life would be like without Tucker Hale.” I sighed. “Part of me is afraid to ask for more. It’s enough that you won your race and that I’ve got my farm and the love of two adoring parents.”
I knew I was blessed, yet discontentment niggled at me. I wanted to marry—in my fantasies, Tuck was always leading man—and have a family of my own. I wanted a separate identity from being the adopted daughter of Ian and Jackie McKinney. Not that the label was bad in any way, but how old did I have to be before I felt like my own person? When could I shed the societal expectations thrust on me from the day the judge announced me a McKinney?
Was I being ungrateful?
Counting my blessings and at the same time bemoaning what I didn’t have just because I wanted more made me seem exactly that. Entitled. Spoiled. Ungrateful.
I laid my head against Dream. The rhythmic rise and fall of his side soothed me. The barn was my happy place outside of being around Tuck. It was the one place that usually quieted the petulant child within me and helped me focus on what mattered. I needed to focus on the next race and my upcoming appointment with Aaron Wellington. A quick glance at my phone showed I had a few minutes before he was due to arrive.
Yesterday, I’d called my dad and asked him for advice on the magazine feature. He’d readily agreed to talk with Aaron and said he’d help Mama see the benefits of speaking with a journalist, especially since Aaron Wellington III wasn’t some tabloid reporter. Dad had assured me it’d all be just fine.
Maybe I should have texted Lamont or Nevaeh. They both knew how to have the press eating out of their hands—even when they’d admitted to fake dating and then truly falling in love.
I hung up the brush and let myself out of the stall. “See you later, boy.”
Dream’s ears flickered again, and this time he tossed his head before digging back into the oats. I left him with the right amount of food so he wouldn’t overeat. No way I wanted to cause any intestinal issues. I needed my winner healthy and ready to get back to his training schedule next week.
I tracked across the yard from the stables to my home. A cold breeze blew through, and I zipped my jacket closed. Oh yeah, I needed to change before Aaron arrived. A T-shirt and jeans didn’t necessarily seem like proper attire to wear to an interview. Or had Mama drummed that kind of thought into my mind?
Now wasn’t the time to have a crisis and wonder if I held a thought of my own. I threw the shirt into my laundry basket and grabbed a blouse from my closet. A spritz of the perfume Mama bought me—good-smelling scents were one thing we could agree on—and I was ready to be interviewed.
Still, my palms remained damp, my heart beat much too fast. My mind filled with a buzzing that could only be related to worry. I had no idea what kinds of questions Aaron would ask despite his so-called sample he’d given me at our last visit. But I was saying yes to the interview because I wanted to show the world how great horse racing was. It was one of the oldest sports in history, capturing the attention of both royals and the common man. Surely a sport that could bridge the class gap wasn’t all that bad.
Yes, there were flaws, but too many people fixated on them. I wasn’t saying ignore them, but they certainly shouldn’t dominate the discussion. Everything should have a balance. If we ignored every good the horse-racing industry brought, we’d continue to see only the harm.
My phone buzzed, showing a visitor at the iron gate that kept out trespassers. I pressed the open button on my security app to allow Aaron to drive through. Knowing how little time it took to drive from the gate to my house, I rushed into the kitchen. After pouring two glasses of sweet tea, plating my favorite cookies, and then setting it all on the coffee table in the living room, I was prepared for company. Mama would be proud.
The doorbell pealed through my home.
“Here goes nothing,” I whispered.
Aaron beamed at me from the other side of the threshold. “Piper McKinney. You might be my favorite meeting to date.”
“Uh...” I stepped back. What was I supposed to say to that? “Come in. We can talk in the living room.” A quick walk past the foyer wall and I turned left.
My home was clutter free. Everything had its place, and I was thankful Mama had always shown me the importance of cleaning up after myself. I didn’t have to worry about Aaron seeing anything unruly. Instead, he’d peer at the white shiplap walls holding various paintings of horses and their jockeys.
Like the one of Aristides and Oliver Lewis, the first Black jockey to win the Kentucky Derby. More importantly, the first jockey to win the Kentucky Derby since he participated in the inaugural 1875 race. Aristides had even had a Black trainer in Hall of Famer Ansel Williamson.
Aaron’s obvious perusal of the paintings turned to the Thoroughbred lampstand on my end table to the glass-top coffee table, whose legs were fashioned from horseshoes, and then to me.
Okay, so maybe he would judge me on décor. What could I say? I was an equestrian lover.
“Have a seat.” I gestured to the cream armchair as I took a place on the couch.
“Thank you.”
“Tea? Cookies?” I reached for the glass on the wooden tray and passed it to him along with a ceramic coaster that held a depiction of a horse painted in watercolor. Okay, maybe I overdid the horse theme when I moved in, but it was my house and solely brought about by my wishes.
“Appreciate this,” he said. He took a sip, then stared at me over the top of the glass. “May I record this meeting?”
Why did that make me want to run from the room? I simply nodded and watched as he pulled a recorder from his jacket and set it on the coffee table.
Aaron took another sip, then placed his glass on the coaster. “I have to admit, I don’t know what to think of you.”
“What do you mean?” Did journalists study their subjects like a scientist studied bacteria growing in a petri dish, fascinated but ensuring they were gloved up?
“You’ve lived a comfortable life here in Eastbrook. I’ve seen pictures of your parents’ estate. It’s obvious you didn’t want for anything growing up. Yet...” He rubbed his mustache.
I crossed my arms, then motioned for him to continue before tucking my hand back underneath my forearm.
“Yet you were adopted. That alone makes me wonder how life as an adoptee was. I read you were adopted at five, I believe. Did you ever feel like anything was missing? Were you able to maintain contact considering the vast distance between the two places?”
So I was the petri dish. Now I rubbed one wrist, trying to formulate a reply. Then I met Aaron’s gaze. “What question do you want an answer to the most?”
He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his thighs as he grasped his hands together, a contemplative look on his face. “Honestly, I want to know what it was like growing up in a fishbowl.”
“Do you mean because my parents are well-known?” Then again, outside of Kentucky and horse-racing circles, who cared about them?
“No.” He stared right into my eyes. “I mean being the only Black person in a white area. I roamed the streets of Eastbrook, and it’s quite obvious they’re not used to seeing people of color. If the whole town didn’t know you were adopted, one or two people probably would have asked if I was related to you.”
I sighed. Why couldn’t his question be about my chances of going to the Derby? Lord, how do I answer something I’m not even sure I’ve entirely processed?
“I don’t know.” I stared at Aaron, my thoughts one jumbled mess. “I don’t mean to be vague, and I’m not trying to ignore your question, but honestly, I don’t know. When I was a kid, obviously, I figured out the differences between me and everyone else pretty quickly. But it was like I was constantly weighing that against what I’d gained. A family. A best friend. Clothes on my body. Food in my stomach.”
I had the barest recollection of being hungry at the orphanage. Only, I wasn’t sure if it was a legit memory or my mind trying to create a backstory that made sense.
“Eventually the stares and mean comments stopped. And I accepted that I’m an only in the sea of a majority. But every now and again, someone does something to make me feel like I don’t belong. Like I’m here only by happenstance.”
“So how do you handle that? Does that sink you into depression? Are you bitter? Because you seem pretty joyful, at least there’s”—he waved a hand in the air—“something about you that says you don’t let those thoughts rule.”
“Trust me, I spiral just like everyone else. But I then remind myself of what God says, so those thoughts don’t rule.”
He shifted in his seat. Was this where I lost the journalist? Would a path toward God make him bolt, or would he forge ahead?
“What does God say?”
Lord, please give me the words to plant a seed or to water what’s already been sown.
“I’ll recite Scripture from the Bible, like Jeremiah 29:11, where it talks about the plans God has for us. No matter my beginning, my middle, or whatever ends up being my end on this earth, God has His hand in it. He saved me from the orphanage. He’s saved me in ways I’ll never know. He’s also blessed me in too many ways to count but never to forget. I remind myself of those things so I don’t continue to spiral but instead reject the unhelpful thoughts. A verse in the book of Philippians talks about focusing on the good. I hold that close to me as well.”
Aaron nodded, and with that answer, he steered the conversation to horse racing and how I caught the fever. The mention of my faith probably made him uncomfortable, but I wasn’t worried. Instead, I would pray, asking that something about my life would speak to Aaron so that he’d be curious enough about God to seek Him for himself.